Plans.

Well, I don't mind admitting, I've rather enjoyed the break. As I indicated, I have continued to place the sports bets over the last week (or to be precise, the good lady of the house has, until today that is, when I reassumed responsibilities) and thanks to On The Oche on Thursday, and Football Elite, The Football Analyst and The Sportsman today, have managed to add a couple of hundred profit to the couple of hundred I'd made prior to my "holiday". Which can't be bad, can it?

I've got to recommend this taking a break thingy though. I had real reservations about doing so but I've not regretted the decision at all. I thought I might stress about missing potential profit making, and for the first day, I did. But I soon dismissed betting from my mind entirely, consciously pushing it right back into the far recesses of my brain, where it stayed until a couple of days ago when I started to put some serious thought into how to move things forward.

I also put some serious thinking into what I hoped to achieve from this blog. Sure, it's fun to write, but ultimately I'd quite like it to deliver a bit more than just a whimsical read. I'm concerned that if I'm not careful, it might become a bit frothy. A pop diva as opposed to a rock chick, if that makes sense? I'd rather there be a bit of substance to it, a sense of purpose, and perhaps over time it might become a useful resource to some. So, with those lofty ambitions in mind, I've made a few plans and am chucking a few ideas around. I'll go into more detail when I have worked out a way forward and sorted the many ideas I have into some sort of order. Presently it's all a bit of a mish mash, a tumble of ideas that need arranging logically and a plan of action drawn up. I'll get there.

One change that I am making with immediate effect is the way I record results. I'm going to knock the monetary detail on the head, and instead concentrate on reporting the profits and losses of each service in terms of points. If anyone really wants to know how much actual money I am making/losing, then my own £/pt value is easily found within the blog. No, what I want to move towards is a situation where followers can see how much they could be making if following the same service(s) by applying their own staking.

What else do I want to introduce? Well, maybe a regular review of the services I use. Articles on various aspects of gambling from mindset to staking to record keeping, etc. Maybe I can convince some service operators to be "interviewed" and provide an insight into playing this game from the other side of the fence.

Of course, the SBC already do all of this and more. I'm not trying to compete. I can't. But what I can do is be the Average Joe figure that the SBC lack (a full time job, a family, bookmaker accounts under continual pressure, paying subs fees, and receiving tips at the same time as everybody else). Mine is a balanced portfolio - six racing services, six sports betting services. It is both large enough to provide a sufficient level of diversity and small enough to be relatively practical to follow. All of the services to which I subscribe are recommended by the SBC. Many reside within their Hall of Fame. If I can't succeed following these services, then might I suggest that nobody can?

I shall make a commitment to recording the results as frequently as possible. Most of the time, that will be each day, and can start from Monday. I will endeavour to provide some commentary too, as opposed to simply providing a list of results.

As far as writing on other subjects is concerned, I will attempt to provide as and when certain topics raise their head. To a large extent though, that will be dictated by when I can fit it around my tennis trading. If there are evening matches, my attention will be elsewhere. Rest assured though, I want this blog to be an acorn. Only hard work will make it grow and that hard work will be going on behind the scenes to put the other ideas I've referred to into place.

Let's see what happens.